One-day event will include all sorts of businesses and nonprofits
As Cloverdale’s downtown shifts, welcoming in new businesses and saying bye to old ones, one thing seems to be a constant — Cloverdale has a lot of passion for its businesses. This passion is the focus of the city’s sidewalk sale, entering into its second year. This year’s sidewalk sale will be held on Aug. 10, from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.
“Last year there were people walking downtown, eating in the businesses, doing things they wouldn’t usually do,” said Neena Hanchett, executive director of the Cloverdale Chamber of Commerce.
Oftentimes, people get in the groove of just jumping on and off the freeway for their shopping needs, rather than patronizing local businesses, Hanchett said. The sidewalk sale hopes to temporarily counteract that, encouraging people from Cloverdale to explore businesses in town and people from outside of Cloverdale to head over and see what the city has to offer.
While it’s difficult for the chamber to track if businesses saw an increase in sales during last year’s event, Hanchett said that many participants experienced increased food traffic.
While sidewalk sales can sometimes put an emphasis on retail locations, Hanchett and Erin Turko, owner of Erin Mavis and the person who led the charge to create a Cloverdale sidewalk sale, both said that everyone is welcome to participate.
Last year, non-retail locations set up tables outside and were giving out water or engaging with the community in other ways.
Looking around the county, other cities have sidewalk sales that last longer than a day, stretching an entire weekend. Though that may seem enticing, Turko said that she doesn’t want to push Cloverdale to have a multi-day sidewalk sale.
Since the city doesn’t currently have a huge retail base, most people interested in taking advantage of sidewalk sale deals can hit up every location in one day. In other cities like Petaluma, multiple blocks of retail locations can make it difficult to explore deals on a tight schedule, so a lengthier sale makes sense.
“In Cloverdale we don’t have that,” Turko said. “I don’t want to see it (the sidewalk sale) get diluted over a few days. I like the bigger impact of one day.”
If the downtown were to grow and more businesses were to pop up necessitating that need, Turko said that it would be great to get the sale to the point of needing to take place across the span of a few days.
That being said, both agreed that businesses who may want to use the entire weekend to promote sidewalk sale-specific deals are welcome to do so.
“It felt like there was a lot of activity (last year), and we want to capture that again,” Hanchett said.
